The Only 8 Seasonings You Need to Buy (2024)

You can fill your cabinet with seasoning mixes, but if you don’t buy the best seasoning you might as well just have salt and pepper. There are only a few seasonings worth actually spending money on—and we found them. After tasting through a silo’s worth of seasoning mixes and spice mixes, we can confidently say that these are the best seasonings around. Whether you’re looking for the best Cajun seasoning, the best popcorn seasoning, or the best seasoning for chicken, these are the eight best spice mixes and seasonings from our taste tests. Throw out that old, rock-hard steak seasoning you got in your stocking ten years ago and buy these instead.

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Best Popcorn Seasoning

Orville Redenbacher’s White Cheddar Popcorn Seasoning

Walmart

Want to turn any popcorn into Smartfood popcorn? This is the best seasoning mix for you to have on hand. You can sprinkle tangy white cheddar dust onto homemade popcorn or bring it to the movie theater for an instant upgrade (yes, movie theater popcorn can get better). Or, heck, use it to dash some extra cheesy seasoning on roasted broccoli. It may be the best popcorn seasoning we tried, but it doesn’t have to end there.

Read the full ranking of the best popcorn seasoning

Credit: Merc / Walmart

Rating:

9/10

Sporks

Best Chicken Seasoning

Stubb’s Chicken Rub with Sea Salt, Honey, Garlic and Mustard

Instacart

Chicken can be great—but it can also be incredibly bland. It doesn’t matter whether you’re seasoning an entire chicken for roasting or just looking to amp up the flavor of a poached chicken breast, this is the best seasoning mix for the job. It gives the chicken a deliciously hickory smoked flavor along with some sweetness from honey and cane sugar, plus a savory mix of garlic, onion, and bell pepper.

Read the full ranking of the best seasoning for chicken

Credit: Liv Averett / Instacart

Rating:

9/10

Sporks

Best Steak Seasoning

Kinder’s The Steak Blend

Amazon

As our lead steak seasoning taste tester put it, “This stuff could make a piece of pineapple tied up in an old shoelace taste like steak.” It smells like savory beef jerky and smoke and it packs a ton of umami flavor. This is the best seasoning for steak because it doesn’t cover up the meat, it just amps it up. It makes the steak taste even steak-ier. And more steak is better steak.

Read the full ranking of the best steak seasoning

Credit: Liv Averett / Amazon

Rating:

9/10

Sporks

Best Burger Seasoning

McCormick Grill Mates Worcestershire Pub Burger Seasoning

Amazon

This is the best seasoning mix for all you grill daddies out there looking to make the best burgers of all. It doesn’t matter if you miss the point of medium rare and cook your patties straight into overdone territory, this seasoning mix will save the day. A blend of tomato powder, brown sugar, bell pepper, and jalapeños, it’s sweet, tangy, smoky, and just a little bit spicy. It makes for a memorable burger—but you can also try it on big ol’ portobello caps or whatever meat you have on hand.

Read the full ranking of the best burger seasoning

Credit: Merc / Amazon

Rating:

9/10

Sporks

Best Taco Seasoning

McCormick Original Taco Seasoning Mix

Amazon

The best seasoning mix for tacos is more than just cumin—although, it certainly tastes like cumin’s a major player in this mix. This spice mix tastes like the Southwest distilled into one seasoning packet. It brings ground meat to life without totally taking over. But it would also be perfectly at home in some from-scratch chili.

Read the full ranking of the best taco seasoning mixes

Credit: Liv Averett / Amazon

Rating:

9/10

Sporks

Best Cajun Seasoning

Cajun Two Step Cajun Seasoning

Walmart

This Cajun seasoning is so incredibly complex and it adds dimension to any dish—chicken, vegetables, straight up plain white rice. It’s bright and zesty and savory. It’s not spicy, but it’s so flavorful, you won’t mind. The man on the label is holding a saltine. Why? We assume because this Cajun seasoning is so good, it’ll even make the world’s blandest cracker taste great.

Read the full ranking of the best Cajun seasoning

Credit: Merc / Walmart

Rating:

10/10

Sporks

Best French Fry Seasoning

Chef’s Fun Foods Salt and Vinegar

Amazon

French fries are great on their own with just a sprinkle of salt, of course. But why have “great” when you could have “amazing”? If you’re looking to take your french fries up a notch, then this is the best seasoning mix to try. It turns french fries into salt and vinegar french fries with just a flick of the wrist. You can also use it on vegetables, eggs, fish, plain potato chips—it’s truly a versatile seasoning mix to have on hand. (And if you don’t like salt and vinegar as a flavor duo, we found some other great french fry seasonings to try.)

Read the full ranking of the best french fry seasoning

Credit: Merc / Amazon

Rating:

10/10

Sporks

Best Trader Joe’s

Trader Joe’s Onion Salt

Trader Joe’s

Out of all the Trader Joe’s seasonings we tried, the store’s onion salt took the top spot. You might think it’s basic, but there’s a lot more than just onion and salt in this seasoning mix. It’s salty, it’s oniony, and it’s also herbaceous. Dash it on eggs, sprinkle it on fried chicken, put it on a baked potato. This is one of the best seasonings to add to almost anything.

Read the full ranking of the best Trader Joe’s seasonings

Credit: Merc

Rating:

10/10

Sporks